Chicks at two and a half months - new big cage

 

Mark and Esme had put together these fence panels to make a new larger cage for the chickens.  We had needed to go to town and get more chips because I didn't have enough left from cleaning the cage last week to fill the bottom of this up.  We put them in and they are quite happy, especially with their new longer perching stick - but hope it will be warm enough in the garage for them at nights.  They are now two and a half months since we bought them at probably less than a week old.  They have really feathered out and changed colors - originally there were five 'yellow and brown chipmunk' colored ones and one dark grey (maybe not the same breed, we are still uncertain if she got put in that bin by mistake).  So far, it still seems they are all hens, as they were sold to us.  We have the thirteen hens and two roosters out in our big coop outside - but these will need to spend maybe another month or so inside before they are big enough to compete with those out there.

 Charlotte dog still has to watch - she had to be calmed down a little because she got very very excited and was beginning to whine.  Esme petted her ears and then we told her it was time for her to go in the main house.  She has been out there a few times, when we have, to check on them.

  

Esme calming down our blue heeler mix, Charlotte, who thinks all baby chickens should be hers to herd

 

  

 Melody goat and Minion cat

This morning I put some new garden soil in one of the raised beds, and checked on different things.  The strawberries are beginning to have berries on them.  Melody goat and Minion cat were sunning themselves on the edge of the fenced yard - and I interrupted them.  I have kale and beans and beets (growing for the greens) and sweet peas coming up, and have transplanted my summer squash plants out to the bed where a few more and some cucumbers were finally germinating.  I want to get some marigold plants and then some tomatoes and peppers.

 We went through all of our spices today - there were one or two that I had been holding on to that weren't any good.  I threw the tarragon out months ago after it had sat untouched for most of a year - and the starter for cleaning out the rest today was that I had ordered some samples of a place's spices that included tarragon and a few other things.  Out of everything there is now one box of things I rarely use but don't feel need to be thrown away, a box that only I use but not often, a box of things that are mostly only used by me but are used commonly, and a small section of shelf of what Mark and I both use on a regular basis.   

I've been studying mostly French - and started Portuguese from French on my phone.  The last few nights, I've dreamt some in French or been asked to translate some things into French.

 

I'm still having some trouble with the jaw on my left side hurting where they took out teeth years ago, made to pop up again perhaps because the denture plate is causing some pressure and infection in the upper plate area.  It isn't anywhere near as bad as when they first gave me the plate, though - for weeks my face was too painful to touch - all over the cheek and nose etc.  

 

Now, it hurts a little here and there and quite a bit right in that jaw place which has no pressure from the denture plate.  The one thing I can't quite get myself to do is to not sleep on that side - the denture plate is out and in a cup for the night so that it doesn't cut - but with hEDS just the pressure of sleeping hard on that side - and for some reason I do sleep HARD on that side when I do - makes anything else that is wrong with those tissues worse.  

 

I've been taking an ibuprofen or two a day and that helps some - and eating as much anti-inflammatory as I can, along with the fat needed to process it.  I will say here though that I have also lost some weight in the past 6 months, not that I probably didn't need to - but it is noticeable enough I have to wear a belt with these jeans now or I am pulling up the pants all day long.   There are many things I just do not want to even try to eat anymore - which again, isn't all that bad mostly.  I just have to watch it that I don't let that get unhealthy.

some photos, melody goat and baby chicks

random photos of Melody asking me if it is dinner time yet

 

 Our elderly tortoiseshell cat, Minion, taking interest in the baby chicks as they are doing a lot more fluttering and running out at times.  They are getting wing and tail feathers and stretching them out to impressive lengths.  It will be a week tomorrow (today, Friday) that we have had them in the brooder.

 

languages: I have been working on French, Japanese and Turkish.   We heard more Turkish spoken in the crime series we are watching and there is also that one manga about the android girl in the post-apocalyptic world that was only available in Turkish so I had went a bit further in it back then to keep understanding words and it was cool to hear a few words in the crime series and say 'hey, I did understand a bit'

a few photos

 

goat out in the fenced in yard on a very cold morning

she is peeking out from behind the tree 

two dogs out there, too - but you can't see them laying down in the sun in the leaves

an elephant flower pot Mark made on his 3D printer, but he wasn't sure it would hold up to soil and water.  I'm not sure what else to use it for, but it is cute.  That is a tote bag I am crocheting in the background in the box

seared pork with lots of spices on it, and some zucchini added at the end, if I use a sharp knife and cut the meat up into shreds, I can eat it.  The zucchini wasn't quite done enough to mash, but I was able to eat some of it.

 

another picture of the same little goat from about a month ago, she is totally blind in one eye and can see some light in the other, she wasn't supposed to live past a few months old - they didn't think she could get past weaning onto solid food etc.. but she is over four years old now
 

Our unconventional Christmas tree, because when we had the hvac installed this summer the stand went missing and we cannot find it.  Didn't let it stop us - Mark and Esme both said 'Australian Christmas' without hearing the other one say it.  This is the same little tree and ornaments we have had forever, and it is on a switch so I can turn it off at night.

 

the bits on a weekend

 Just got back from taking mother-in-law to town and getting her groceries.  Going to make chicken noodle soup with a bit of onion powder simmered in it, and green tea with pineapple juice for Esme for lunch.  She came along to help us with the groceries but she has a runny nose again.  We've been working on catching up on her math for school - the class she failed last year, because she couldn't access the program that was 40% of her grade.  I did some chatting with her teacher last week and finally asked the right question, and got us access at home to the program.  She just kept saying 'have her bring the computer to me' and that wasn't working, one way or another.  Finally I asked if there was still an online portal to use like they did during Covid when they did online schooling - and she said oh yea, there is - and told me how to access it.  Now she can work slowly through these chapters for half-credit and we will be able to keep up with her current assignments much better because she says sometimes she can't do them in class with all the screaming and pushing and shoving that goes on with the other students.

 

Car is doing okay, what it should.  The little trick we have been using to get open the gas cap door has been working well.  

 

My joints along my left side are still taking turns with who wants to complain today.  I try not to complain general, but did post yesterday that 'nineteen hundred fifty eight' bones in my left hip were having a word with me.  That is what it feels like - there is a hitch between two places that shouldn't even be IN that joint, and nothing is quite working in the right place between them - like shifting a car and for some reason it keeps getting stuck in between, but it works, and you can't get it to shift to the right position - and you know it SHOULDn't work that way, but it is, and just what is it damaging doing that??  A lot like that.  Mark says my joints don't have sockets, they have 'orbits'.  That's not far off, either.  Most of it will work itself out if I just don't overstrain things, eat right, and keep exercising it/using it normally.  

 

It is so ironic that with hEDS letting it 'rest' doesn't help as much as people would think,   If something  is 'stuck' letting it stay in that position and not stretching it out is the wrong approach.  But, you also do have to make sure that in grinding it through the 'slightly wrong position' (called sublux actually) doesn't really mess up something.  The snappy muscle bits will snap back in place if 1.) your nutrition stays good and 2.) you use it properly and stretch/crack it properly throughout the day  and 3.) you don't get an ACTUAL injury in the meantime.  I didn't sleep too long in one position last night, either - rolling over every few hours, which helps a lot.  When I'm just really really tired and I sleep for four to six hours straight - things tend to drift more and then getting the bones where they should be can be an unwanted surprise first thing trying to get out of bed.

 

Still doing Japanese on three programs and two profiles now - although I'm only doing the bare minimum.  One of the new apps on my phone keeps yelling at me at random times and I had to explain that to Esme.  Ha.  Oh, yes, my phone just said that because I have only done one lesson today.  It wants attention?  Yes, it does.

 

Speaking of, yesterday I had gotten home from the postal route and our little blind goat, Melody, was crying outside.  She was saying BAA very loudly, because she could hear I was in the kitchen.  She wants fresh food from the bin, like a house cat, and she wants someone to pet her head and say 'what a pretty goat' while she eats inside (she has an inside and an outside bowl).  Also, much like a house cat.  So when she heard me she began baa-ing very loudly.  Mark was in his office, and I was in the kitchen - and we both, at the same moment, said 'BAA' back at her - in the exact same tone - and he came out of his office and looked at me.  We said 'BAA' the exact same way, we speak the same dialect of goat.  I asked him what he had MEANT when he said BAA, because that would explain if it was the same dialect.  He said 'in a minute', and I would have said 'yes, eventually' (which, in welsh, 'in a minute' means about that exactly).  So yes, we both speak 'goat' to the goat when she is crying and it IS the same dialect.  *ha* 

flu

 The summer is almost gone, Esme starts back to school this week.  Last week I went down with the flu, although I struggled through the fevers and the chills and the 'where is my bed' every day when I got home and actually made it to the end of the week without missing work.  I was literally sweating non-stop, and then a few hours later, so cold in the same temperature (87 degrees) that I could not stop my teeth chattering.  I was drinking as much as I could but food was out of the question more and more through Thursday and Friday.  On Friday I was still holding onto the hope that I would make it through the postal route and then rest for a day and a half and be miraculously better.  

 

But, at midnight on Friday I began to throw up, painfully - as I had a mostly empty stomach - and I had to call out of the postal route for Saturday.  Saturday turned out to be a very bad day - there were moments I didn't want to be upright, standing, laying down or anything - I was semi-aquatic taking baths or showers every few hours, and letting the water evaporate on me.  My hair bothered me on my neck, my head felt like the skull was coming apart into pieces, and my sinuses were upset because I had thrown up and anything I tried to eat or drink was immediately met with 'no you're done with that now, really'.  I would try to sleep and be back up in an hour and a half.  The day seemed like four stuck together, and not in a good way.  Sunday was a bit better, although I felt like someone had thrown me around like a rag doll and my muscles and joints hurt.  The spot I fell last month in the yard on my hip was hurting like new.  And vomiting so very hard had messed up my stomach badly, my gut was hurting and I took the rest of that week slowly getting my system back into order.  Castor oil *yuck*, but I think I'm mostly back on track now.  I do not recommend eight year old castor oil - but I was glad that we had a bottle of it, and I need to replace it.  One dose was all it took, but it was very unpleasant.  Take that over the pain though.

 

So I've been catching up on things, went to the feed store, made sure all the bills were paid, and replaced some other things we needed in the house.  My sense of smell during the flu was through the roof - and then after the chills stopped, my sense of hearing was overly sensitive, too.  I was hearing pops and squeals in the car and in appliances etc that I had not heard for a long time.  I even put coolant and oil in the car, and pulled in the dry bean harvest from the garden.  They are pole beans and the beans are a reddish-brown color.  I planted a handful of miscellaneous things this year since I've had such hit and miss planting something specific - and this is the type of bean that has thrived. 

 

Our little goat had a bad time last night, as well.  She is blind, and when she gets too worried she has no idea where she is - as she usually uses a system of counting steps and moving along certain edges to know where she is in the yard.  She ate a bit of watermelon - and that was a bad idea.  I've told Mark sure that looks cute and she likes it, but no, it was quite bad for her.  She got a bit disoriented, as that is basically alcohol for a goat, and she got tangled up in a vine behind the house here.  We went and pulled her in after she didn't come in with the cats for their dinner, as is her habit.  She wants to be involved, even though she doesn't eat cat food.  But she wasn't there, so we had to go find her.  She had gotten herself into a tizzy caught in the vine, and it took several more hours to calm her down and get her to sleep without startling.  She was very tired, and staggering.  She slept leaning on one or the other of us for a while, and then she felt much better and has been walking normally and getting around the yard fine today.  No more watermelon for goats.

 

We took Grandma to town for her groceries.  Mark is making dinner, he has been making dinner for Esme all the past week or so, as I was eating sparingly still and usually strange combinations.  Only last night I made her fish and rice, which is one of the few normal meals I'd eaten, as he had eaten too much of the potato that he cooked the night before and it hadn't been great for him.  I am glad though neither of them seem to have been hit with the flu - and the 'contagious' part of it would have been weeks ago.  I've been reading a book and did some laundry.  Another week, with school bus et al, to begin tomorrow.

 

For languages : I'm doing the highest level French (5th section on Duolingo) and have returned to the beginner Japanese on my phone. 

Thursday bits

Daphne (dog, 12 years old), and Melody (blind dwarf Nigerian goat) out in the yard as I was cooking this morning, talking (I think) about the cat that had been sunning himself in that area just recently and where he was now that he was out of smell range.  They both went back and forth in that same little area for a little while after the cat got up, and the goat seemed to 'ask questions' to the dog, and then finally they both laid back down for a bit before Daphne decided it was time for her to bark at the door and go into the other bigger yard.

It is August, and the yard has been really really dry - but they have a big water trough (not seen from this angle) and we dump it and refill it every few days (lots of salamanders, frogs, and even sometimes little ringneck snakes there!).  There is some pigweed growing in one area but the goat finds anything she can reach that she likes (including tree branches and vines on the fence) and eats it with relish, as well as her alfalfa and oats she gets inside the house when we bring her in every few hours for a snack and a scratch and someone to tell her she isn't alone.  

 

Dogs and cats always going in and out at all hours, they each have their own way of asking.. we laugh sometimes that the goat 'meows' at the door when she is really lonely, having learned it from the cats.  That's even funnier, because the cats are Manxes and they hardly can make a squeak - but the goat really does sound like a cat when she cries loudly.

 

Made fried rice from leftovers and green onions in the freezer.  Crushed up a few dry roasted peanuts to put on top with some red chili paste.  I need to make another pot of rice to put up for the weekend later, but I have the container I like to keep it in the dishwasher right now. (reason for using up the last bit of rice)

 

Esme and Mark worked on the electrical boxes and wiring that she is trying to learn.  He had her taking bits apart in the garage to learn how to do it hands-on.  She has said she wanted to study that more, but hadn't been willing to get her hands on things that might break - so he gave her some old things from building the house and asked her to dismantle them to their base parts and then they'll hook them back up and she can see how to do it all properly in the garage circuits.

Other than that, did two hours of Japanese learning this morning, much more than I usually ever do for only one language.  And that is on top of what I will do later on this evening.  Usually I do about 15 minutes to an hour of multiple languages in the morning, and repeat that (not always with the same languages) later in the evening.  

This week, I've been doing almost exclusively Japanese.  I was told that Japanese is my best bet for any future translation work - and I admit it needs some more focus than I was giving it, especially in vocabulary.  

I'm doing the level 19-->20 on one Duolingo account, and reviewing level 10 Japanese on the other one instead of using the second one for multiple languages as I had been doing.  I've done babadum several times a day to 50 or 100 cards, baltoslav tools a few times each (you get three-strikes-out on there, but you can start over as many times as you want)  and tried translating anything I see on FB and Pinterest, and doing Clozemaster (that is Japanese and then Chinese, which does help with understanding the kanji characters), although that is only a few minutes every night.  My brain is doing the 'Hey, do you know this?' for words and symbols even when I'm doing other things, so that is working.  I know it is working best when the language keeps infringing later and things I didn't get quite right or wasn't 100% certain about (what is the symbol for ima (now, in Japanese), you know it when you see it but what IS it.. could you draw it?)

*baltoslav vs. babadum:  baltoslav there is no sound - you have to know what it says (hiragana or katakana shown, my katakana is still a bit shaky in the f and r sections, actually.. but this is helping), BUT, the kanji are there to help / intrigue you... and make connection.  You can keep google translate up in the next window and check the pronunciation to make sure you are reading it right, and that is cheating - but what is better than immediate reinforcement of the right sound / meaning when you don't know it?  babadum is the pronunciation and the hiragana/katakana mix, but no kanji, and you don't get to check what the right answer was because it is swoop onto the next thing, you got it right or wrong - and that is pretty good for learning like a child, as well - you start remembering what the right thing is because you want to get it right, but I am finding using both I'm learning differently on both, and that both help tamp down the pegs into the right places for vocabulary.  I think I kind of need a little of both.

I get along pretty good in it when I'm focusing on it, although I would still say it is well below my reading ability in French.  Japanese uses its own scale (N5 being the lowest level, up to N1 the fluent level) than the European languages (A1 being the lowest, and then A2, B1, B2 and C1 and C2 reaching fluent level).  I would have to say I know a lot of N5, but probably would still have to take a test in it several times because I am sure there are gaps between what they test and teach, just like everything has.  

 

I have a short work shift tomorrow, hoping the vehicle does all it should.  And then I have regular shifts on Saturday and Sunday.  I don't know when there might be traction on the little car we were told about - but he says he will let us know as soon as he knows something.  I stopped by there with the truck yesterday and got some of the issues it is having right now worked out, but not all - that brake spring is still not easy to fix, the fix we made broke again on the way back to the house *sigh*

Still : 

Yesterday the washing machine was acting up and the dryer looked like it had not dried the clothes or I had forgotten to turn it on.  Reset everything, and the washer finished out okay - whatever it was, it worked out.  The washing machine spun down to empty.  The dryer dried the clothes, and then I put the washed clothes in for the next load and they dried, as well.  I made dinner, Mark changed up what he was doing halfway through, and suggested instead we make two separate meals where I was working on one .. but I segued and still made what we were looking for, and what he wanted, and then we sat down and ate it while watching a cute film 'Earwig', a 2020 Studio Ghibli collaboration I had not even heard of.  I had a small nosebleed for about an hour through all of that - whatever luck that was it decided that was the right time for it and I just kept moving and tried to get done what we were doing, and it stopped finally.  I haven't had that for a long time, but then I haven't had a sinus infection for months, either - so I guess it follows trying to clear out all of that.   Today, I'm doing okay, working on the language work.  Next stress will be getting the vehicle to work on Friday and back home - and the battery is charging itself now, it was at 13.03 volts after I returned home which is well enough to crank it for Friday.   I just have to remember to not let the brake lights stay on when I'm not in the vehicle.

Funny bit : 

Night before last we made some egg / rice dog bread stuff with the rest of the pork grease and broth in the pork roast pan.  That is sort of a rich treat, so they didn't get all of it after it cooled, and we put some up in a bag in the fridge to give out here and there.  This morning, when I let the dogs out after the school bus ran, they lounged around the porch for a while.  Then, Minerva started barking she wanted to come in.  I went to let her in and the other two, Daphne and Charlotte, were laying in the leaves.  They both simultaneously put heads up, ears rotated, and everything about their body language said 'Will there be Snacks?'  It was a very clear communication to me.. so I said 'There could be, yes.'  To which, they popped up immediately and came running in to the house and all the way downstairs in front of me.  

Minerva had gotten up on the couch while I was talking to them, and looked at me like 'What did I miss?'  I said 'Snacks, come on' and she popped up and went downstairs, too.  I started giving them out and called for Sweetie, who was sleeping in the office on a dog bed, and she didn't come.  I went into the office with a piece in my hand and she curled up tightly and said 'I don't want another bath! (she got one last night, and it was cold apparently all night for her)'  But then I bounced the egg bread in my hand and she popped her head up and said 'OH' and followed me back into the kitchen.  Everybody got two more bits of egg bread and I put the last back up for later tonight.

I just love dog language - it is funny, and their emotions are very deep, from the I don't want a bath to surprise to pleading with their eyes for something they know is there (in the fridge, downstairs) and I still understand exactly what they are 'talking' about.

starting to fill out the categories

 

I'm starting to put together the categories I want to talk about at : Neurodivergent Cooking  I've got a couple of recipes up, and a couple of ADHD rants, for lack of a better term.

 

The categories I'm going for are : 

Dinner for Two

Red Plate Specials (getting food to the plate for one)

Less Waste

ADHD Hacks and Habits (and rants, apparently... *roll eyes at self*)

Make Ahead Ingredients (nothing there yet)

and Our Farm - animals and garden and etc etc..

 

But I was tired today - I fell over for a nap, and then pushed myself through to use some leftover things to make a dinner for Esme and I (the Dinner for Two category above).  Mark took some pictures of a mantis outside and also ended up being butted by a little goat so much he tried to take some pictures of her, too - and ended up with mostly out of focus nose, except this one.

 

Melody, our little Nigerian dwarf bottle-raised goat, who is more than 3/4 blind (but she can see some light in one eye)

She had just gotten some of the ends of lettuce and tomato - so she was wondering why he was out there now and what other wonderful vegetables he had to be hiding in his hands (she is blind) way up there with the camera.

I made a salad, and a version of fried rice.  I did take pictures and post a step by step.  Even though it is simple - it is still something.  And I was working on that consistency thing, just as much as the use up the leftovers thing.

Recipe post  : Half-Nicoise Salad

Maybe tomorrow after route we'll make something more ambitious - but I suspect that will actually be Friday.  I work the weekend, as well, as usual.  I'm headed to bed now again (it is 8:30 pm) and up early to get Esme to the bus and off to work.

Languages : I did French today, and Japanese.

Snow 2024 : Episode Three

 

 

The crochet floor rug I'm working on, the other one is still a big hit downstairs but there isn't enough of it.

 

Today was Too Much Adventure, as I call it.  I was called in yesterday to do the full city walking postal route, and I did, get it done, and got home with only some fishtailing and 'hold your hat' over the hill, but I did not enjoy it.  And today, they called me and told me that kid was calling out again, and so I came in - delivered the packages, and it was only two and a half hours, but it had begun to rain and then it was due to freeze again.  

 

I tried three times to make it back up the hill to my house (after the highways were clear, but our side road is NOT.. and it was 29 degrees and people were sliding all over town even on clear highways, I saw the reports).. and the truck was smoking, and I decided to call it 'it could be worse - let's not have it worse' and park it in a neighbor's turnaround with a SORRY note sticking out the window with my phone number on it.  It didn't block their drive - but I'm sure it was 'what, why?'... but the other option was keep trying as it kept getting icier and maybe end up upside-down in the ditch.  The second and third time I tried to get up that hill I was sliding on the return towards the ditch also... and it wasn't fun at all.  

 

So, I threw on the emergency gear I had put in my seat each day this week for walking in this weather- big rubber boots (which, I actually wore on the route today as well as my good shoes got soaked yesterday) and an oversized parka over my normal parka jacket - and walked the mile and a half home.  I'm hoping to go out there (also dressed like this) in a few days when it is close to water temperatures again and take my plastic sled and a bin of salt with me and see if that will make the difference to get me the rest of the way home for the melt on Monday (when I'm scheduled again though, before the melt) **sigh**

 

A self-portrait of me walking in my big orange parka and rubber boots today

 

 

 

Melody, our mostly blind goat, enjoying some time inside (tied to the desk, because she singes herself) next to the propane heater

 

The heater is popular, here is Melody (nose showing only), Minion (cat), and Charlotte and Daphne (dogs) before they realized I had a camera and was taking a picture of them.

  

Chickens asking: Where is dinner? 

 

Charlotte going out with me to check on and feed the chickens.

tangible

It was a bit colder than I liked out there this morning, but the dewdrops were shining very pretty from the rain last night.  The lemon balm (Above) was such a bright bright green I am glad the camera could catch some of it.

The rose bush is putting out its new leaves, transforming red to green.  I caught a nice close-up of it, too, doing its thing.

and one of our resident herd dogs (Sweetie) behind the fence watching the goat trying her very best to eat a Cherokee rose bush, which is behind another fence! (for just that reason).  She is tied up on a long dog lead string that stretches up and down our driveway, allowing her to eat any greens along that pathway.  And I come out with the camera she gets my attention and says 'I can still eat this.  See?'

In the obscure thought category.. I had this memory come back to me today as I walked up to the mailbox to pop an order for seeds into the mailbox.

I remember when I was a child (probably 9 or 10) kneeling down on the board over the creek at Arbo Road, the one that flowed into the Prairie River, and holding a big flat slate rock in the current.  I remember how cold the water was, as cold as the air this morning, and how strong the flow was, pulling against my grip on the rock like a lever.  I remember thinking how very cold it was, and how much of the water had passed by, and how much was still coming downstream.

It was probably thinking of all of those idioms from the farm yesterday - reliving those moments, feeling the place and the grass, the trees and the road in my mind's eye again... It is something I wish I could take pastels or paints to paper and make visible for everyone - but so much of my good memories are tangible, inexplicable almost memories.  It is a feeling of bounded and boundless space meeting and intersecting, the taste of the air and how it changes between sun and shadow, dry grass and moss, the tangy scent of creeping charlie as it is pulled from creeping up the walls, green painted tarpaper rough under fingers, sundried sheets slightly stiff on the line, big yellow basswood leaves flapping in the wind, yet soft and slick at the same time under your fingers, dried leaves brittle and separating into a thousand fragments in your hand...  It is the change in temperature, the feel of old enamel painted metal and rusted red iron  and big flat stones leading to the house and distance looking down the gravel road. 

This is the Cherokee Rose, (Rosa laevigata) that the goat is trying to eat up above.  It will bloom soon in a fragrant profusion of small white flowers with yellow centers.  Here is the Wikipedia link. It says it is actually an invasive species to North America, but brought so long ago, in the 1700s, that it has naturalized across the Southeastern United States.  My husband's family definitely thinks of them as naturalized.  They are popping up in several places in the woods here, and we have let this one continue to grow where it came up and enjoy it every year.  The bees love them, they gather around the flowers as well when they arrive.

Life with Catahoulas web comic number 1

Our UPS Lady was a bit confused this Christmas Eve!
They'd both bark, if they could.
I think the goat was trying to bark anyway!

This is the first 'Life with Catahoulas' web comic strip.  Enjoy!
I'll try to update every week, Monday or Tuesday

I've been talking about 'life with catahoulas' for years, since we have five of them, all with different personalities.  Besides them, we have a German shepherd puppy, a Bluetick hound, four cats and a goat that get into the mix.  There's always something going on.

A Green Goat

I drew out the pattern for this soft toy today. I did it all freehand, intending it to be a donkey. Then instead of using my gray fabric (of which there is little) I grabbed this green and came out with .. well, not a donkey!



She is a goat, or a lamb.
She is for Esme.
Maybe we'll call her Gertie, or Mabel.

And I think I will develop the pattern some bit further, to put up in the Etsy shop. It is all patterns there now, no toys. I no longer have the time or storage solutions to make items up for sale there - but I can make things for Esme and develop patterns and maybe one day put it all together in a book.



Maybe I'll be able to change the shape into a donkey still... but there may be no need as it is all smiles for this 'green lamb with a dress.'



Well, after I posted she now insists it is a green kangaroo, with a big tail, and a dress. I wonder what someone else would call it!

This zig zag quilt tutorial is amazing. I want to do it, in grey and yellow and white? In orange and grey and white? I am thinking. These Joel Dewberry Aviary fabrics in yellow and grey inspire me... but I'm not hot on the fabric itself. I see those same colors in grey with polka dots, plain yellow or honeycomb pattern and soft washed muslin. Oh wait... like Esme's Shirt de buzz buzz! Exactly. Hmm..

This quilt inspired me to look for the pattern : Namoo Orange Wave quilt. Beautiful. Nice shop description as well. I wish them happiness :)

// found a knit zigzag blanket tutorial that goes knit row, purl row, (k2tog)*3, (yo,k1)*6, (k2tog)*6, (yo, k1)*6, (k2tog)*3 on a multiple of 36 stitches. It actually looks like a lot of medallion-like shells, but does zigzag nicely. Also found a harder to remember but more zigzaggy style one, also on 36 stitches, knit row, purl row, k1, k2tog, k6, yo, k1, yo, k6, (k2tog)*2, k6, yo, k1, yo, k6, k2tog, k1, purl, knit, repeat. Have not tried that one yet. similar